The adventure log is where you list the sessions and adventures your party has been on, but for now, we suggest doing a very light “story so far” post. Just give a brief overview of what the party has done up to this point. After each future session, create a new post detailing that night’s adventures.

One final tip: Don’t stress about making your Obsidian Portal campaign look perfect. Instead, just make it work for you and your group. If everyone is having fun, then you’re using Obsidian Portal exactly as it was designed, even if your adventure log isn’t always up to date or your characters don’t all have portrait pictures.

Intro

A whip crack breaks the silence of the still air. The courtyard that was so silent a few moments ago is filled with the cries of Ol’ Johnson Thatcher. Birds content to sit idly on rooftops take flight and scream along with Thatcher as the whip falls again and again on his exposed back. The courtyard is surrounded by the other slaves, mostly political prisoners from the failed Monmouth rebellion against King James and assorted other convicts. They stand out in the noon day sun watching this beating while A few foremen stand on the walkway along the palisade with muskets and the other walking bosses roam through the crowds with clubs at the ready. Bernard Hughs, the head overseer, looks down upon the poor wretch as he lets the whip fly without any kind of emotion…certainly not pity.

“Hold”

Bernard stops, dropping the whip down to his side, and then turns to the voice while coiling the whip in his hands. Sir Jonathon Randolph Whitby is not a large man but he has a certain commanding presence. His frock coat cut in the latest fashion seems out of place in the dense humid air of this wild place and His face carries a sternness that makes believable the myth that he carved out the land for his plantation and the nearby Town of Whitby with naught but his acid tongue and a glare. He walks towards the poor prisoner in the center of the courtyard.

“Look well you mangy curs. Many of you forget that it is only through the boundless generosity of my good friend King James who, in his mercy, commuted many of your sentences of death.”

He motions to Thatcher, lashed to a beam serving as a makeshift pillory, the many lashes on his back pouring blood.

“This craven dog attempted to escape last night. He spat upon our good King’s charity and as such spat on all that is well and good in this god forsaken land. Bernard.”

Bernard attaches the whip to a loop on his belt and heads to a fire pit with a handle sticking out. He pulls it out to reveal a brand glowing white hot.

“T. This stands for treason. Any man marked as such will be known as a fugitive traitor…Burn this into your memories lads, lest it be burned in your hide as well! Bernard.”

Bernard takes the brand and places the glowing letter against Thatcher’s cheek. His pitiful wail does not completely drown out the sound of sizzling flesh.

“Here endeth the lesson. Bernard, let them ruminate on this new found knowledge without distraction. Half rations today I think. Feed them and water them half rations. Perhaps next time they will think twice before one of their compatriots tries something like this.”

Bernard places the brand back into fire and motions to his walking bosses who start moving the other slaves along to get their ration of gruel

“…and him?” Bernard nods towards Thatcher.

“Leave him up for awhile and then summon that doctor. Bind his wounds. I expect him ready to work before the sun comes up. Hell isn’t ready for him yet. Wolverston has just sailed into port and we need to have our goods transported to the dock and loaded out before the dockmaster awakens…My agents will have his head swimming in rum tonight, making tomorrow’s inspection much easier. I swear, deliver me from honest dock masters…bribery may be more expensive but it isn’t nearly as much work…”

Whitby and Hughs walk out of the courtyard and on towards the big house making plans for tonight’s illicit operation while slaves receive their meager gruel in a silence only broken by Thatchers moans or a foreman’s curse.

"Now we be wagon pirates."

Getting off the Island.

Those sons of bitches from the Big House woke us up in the middle of the night and told us to go load up a cart. Why did they pick me? I'm tiny compared to everyone else…except the funny little man. I mean, I'm taller, but he outweighs me by a lot.

Anyway, out we went into the night to load up a bunch of Rum and Sugar Cane. Well, I started straight away because I didn't want no beatin' again. And I saw what happened to Thatcher. I'm going to have nightmares for weeks.

Anyway, the funny little man starts dancing around and doing a little play or something, but I can tell he wants someone to get the keys to unlock the stockade. I really didn't want to do it, but he seemed so insistent and nobody else seemed to understand. Well, I walked over there trying to be casual, like I was going after Zarola and I was able to nick the keys while the two bad men were distracted.

Just as I walked back away from them, I heard a noise like thunder and suddenly the big wooden wall, I think it is called a palisade, was blasted open and one of the bad men got killed right off the bat. The funny little man pretended that he was dying but I could tell he was just acting again. I think I like that funny little man. So, then Derry goes and starts punching the other bad man as I run up the hill to unlock the stockades. That's when I see that one of them has a hole in it and Ol' Remus is staggering out with blood on him.

Well, I went and unlocked the other stockade and went with the Doctor to help out in the other stockade where people were hurt. But then we had to run because the really big bad man and his horrible dog started coming down from the Big House.

We ran down to the cart and I helped Thatcher down there 'cause he's the only one that knows how to drive a cart properly. I helped him in and jumped in the back. Then we took off and started down the road. We got shot at, but nobody got hit. We could see that there were a couple of ships in the harbour and they were firing on the Big House property and on the town.

We slowed down and Derry and I scouted ahead to try to find a ship. Oh, that's right, Old Smokey said that we should find Wolverton and get on his ship and that it was a single masted Sloop. Well, Derry and me, we looked at the first dock and there was a Sloop there but it was in a sad state. The mast was all limp and hanging to the side.

We ran back up to the cart to see if that was the right one, but Old Smokey said it wasn't, so we kept on looking. The middle dock was on fire and all the docks had longboats filled with those bastard Spanish Dogs in them.

We had to make our way through town to get to the third dock and everybody was trying to get their stuff and get away before the Spanish Dogs came and stole everything and burned the town down. I figured why not grab something on the way. I was looking for something that might help us on a boat. I saw a box and thought it might have something interesting in it. I opened it up and it had a compass and a journal with a bunch of entries. I can't wait to sit down and read it.

Well, we went right for the third dock and got in a fight with the Spaniards just getting out of their boat. Derry sure is good in a fight. He just punched them until they couldn't stand up. I helped a little as did some of the others, but it mostly helped distract them so Derry could beat 'em up real good.

Finally we saw Wolverton and he was cutting his lines and casting off. I knew he was our last chance so I grabbed a cask of Rum and ran as fast as I could toward him. I started screaming to wait for us and that we have Rum on account of Old Smokey sayin' he was a drunk and liked his alcohol. That brought him up short. Some other guy started yelling at Wolverton that they couldn't accommodate all of us, and Wolverton told him tough and that we was getting on if we had rum.

So, all of us brought on a cask of Rum and a real big black man stacked them up nice. The yelling guy said that there wouldn't be enough room, so Wolverton had the big guy throw the yelling man overboard.

Now that we are onboard, I sure hope we can get away from those Spanish Dogs.

"I'm on a boat!"

Getting Our First Ship

No sooner did we get aboard Wolverston's ship, The Mermaid's Trumpet (I don't really know what that means), everyone decided to take one of the Spanish ships. Despite never working together on a ship we all did pretty good. Mack took the Pilot's Wheel and that concerned me a little. But I guess he did ok, 'cause he only scraped the dock a little bit and it didn't hurt anything.

Anyway, we got up to the ship really fast, but on our way, the Spanish dogs fired two of their cannon at us! Luckily, they missed like the shit eating dung beetles that they are. I'm not sure that makes sense, but I just love to call Spaniards "Shit eating dung beetles".

Ok, so there we were coming up along side the Spanish ship and I thought I would try the same trick again where I call out, "Sálvame señor!" which means "Save me sir!" after climbing up the rigging and swinging across on a rope. I guess in all the excitement, my foot slipped and I ended up hanging upside down in the rigging for a moment. Well, I was able to right myself and grab a rope and swing across.

I jump off the rope right next to this big guy with a boarding axe. I cry out "Sálvame señor!", but it looked like he didn't believe me. He raised up his axe to hit me when suddenly he disappeared into a fine red mist. Then I realized that the Funny Little Man (Hammy) had been screaming something. I look back to the Mermaid's Trumpet and see him screaming and dancing in joy right next to a cannon holding a burning taper. I've never liked anyone more than Hammy at that moment.

Then the other Spaniard next to me dropped his gun and put up his hands as another one jumped overboard. I looked around and while I was trying to climb the rigging and swing across, my friends had killed almost everyone on the ship.

We realized that we had two seaworthy vessels and might have a chance of getting away with both of them. We sent Dom back across to Wolverston and had them sail in front of us. Then we all put on Spanish breastplates and helmets and pretended like we were chasing them. We even fired the cannons at them to make it convincing. Luckily those stupid Spaniards believed that we were just chasing down a ship and let us go without any "help".

Once everything calmed down we all started exploring the ship. I went looking for hidey holes and crawl spaces. I found two really good ones that I don't think anyone will find until we unload all the cargo. While I was exploring one of them, I noticed Hammy had dragged out a big locked box. He kept calling for everyone to come down, but they were all above deck and couldn't hear him. So Hammy goes running up the stairs to get everyone. I jumped down and grabbed a nail laying nearby and popped the lock open. I have never seen so many pieces of eight and gems and jewels in my life! There were also some papers, so I started looking at them just as most of the crew comes down, including Mack who was supposed to be piloting the ship. Hammy also had a manifest that listed all of the cargo, even the loot in the big box.

We know that we don't want Wolverston getting his hands on this, so I have Derry help me get the lockbox up to one of my hidey holes and then I cover it with other crates so you can't see it without moving a bunch of stuff. After that, I climb down and head above deck.

It seems that I was just in time, because there's Wolverston on deck with that giant of a man, Dom. As soon as they are on deck, Wolverston starts talking about finding the manifest and the lockbox. I offer to go down into the hold to help them look for it. I managed to convince Dom that I thought I saw someone with a book tucked into their belt jump overboard just as we were taking the ship. Since he is unable to find it, I think he believes me. Both Wolverston and Dom are very frustrated at this point and decide that they have to do an inventory.

I offer to help with the inventory. I made Dom do all the writing as I reported what I found. Ha ha! He isn't very good at writing so it took a long time. While we were doing that, I guess the rest of the guys had a discussion about how we should run the boat and so they came down to discuss that with Wolverston. I thought there might be another fight for a bit, but Wolverston and Dom just said that we should all go above deck to discuss it. I made sure to get some rum for Wolverston.

A discussion was had and we all voted for a captain. Mack tried to get people to vote for him, so I told everyone that I would sooner be captain than have him be captain. Don't get me wrong, I like Mack and he's funny, but he could never be a captain. At that point, Hammy starts crying out "The Boy Captain!". It was really a joke, but I thought for a moment that he might have convinced people. I think it is good that I didn't end up captain though. Oh, Hammy actually got elected as captain. He's really good at talking to people and raising their spirits, so I think he will make a good captain. Not to mention he sure knows how to fire a cannon. Hmmmmm, maybe he should be Captain Cannon. As much as I like Hammy, I just don't think it will intimidate anyone.

Well, we get Hammy elected as Captain. but Wolverston says that Hammy should be the captain of the Mermaid's Trumpet. I can tell you that none of us liked that idea and I got worried there might be another fight. Luckily some of the guys had cool heads like Mathias and they convinced Wolverston, with the help of Dom, that we should be the ones out fighting in this big ship while he relaxed on his boat.

Old Smokey said that now we have to write out the Articles of Agreement and all sign it. I guess it is the rules we all live by as a member of the ship. I hope they aren't too harsh. I was a slave once, and I don't want to be one again. I'll just have to wait and see.

"Derry jumps ship, but not the way you would think."

Time to sell our stuff

I got to know the Spanish Dogs and found that they aren't really so bad. They just seem like everybody else after all. Maybe it is just the important Spaniards that are the dogs? I'll have to think about this some.

Well, we spent three days in that cove getting things ready. We had to make some dye to cover up the Spanish colors on Chain Breaker. Oh yeah, we named our ship the Chain Breaker on account of it being our way out of slavery. I think it is a pretty good name. OH, and we came up with a good name for the captain that should inspire fear. Instead of "Funny Little Man" or "Hammy", we now call him "Captain Redmist" on account of him turning a pirate to nothing but red mist after he hit him dead on with the cannon. It was really impressive shooting. I didn't know you could be that accurate with a cannon. Then we elected Derry to be the Quartermaster, but I like calling him the Puppet Master because of the funny thing he did with the Spaniard where he shoved his hand up the top half of him and pretended to make him talk. Oh, and Matthias took over the surgery.

So anyway, we created this terrible bad smelling dye to cover up the colors on the sails. Unfortunately, now our ship smells like fish guts. It is really disgusting. I have to eat at the front of the boat while we are sailing so I don't smell it so much.

From the loot we found, we split up 500 of the pieces of 8 and gave each of us original slaves 50 pieces. We called it the Slave's Share on account of us all being slaves until we took that ship. Then while Dom and I were inventorying everything and creating a new manifest, I "found" the lockbox with 300 pieces of 8 worth of loot. Derry and the Capt. thought it would be best if we did find something. It would make everyone else feel better and it did. The Capt. and Derry are real smart.

The last thing we did before setting sail for Nassau was write out the articles and all sign them. Even the Spaniards signed them, so I guess they are part of the crew now.

We made way to the port in Nassau and we thought everything was going to be fine. I was on the Mermaid's Trumpet with Wolverston and when the longboat approached us with Jimmy, he's one of Guthrie's men, everything went fine, but then he approached the Chain Breaker. That's when everything went bad. Well, mostly bad for Jimmy, but we had to deal with stuff too.

Jimmy and his men row up between our ships and ask about our ship and our captain. Capt. Redmist starts introducing himself and talking to Jimmy. Oh, we didn't know he was named Jimmy yet. Anyway, Jimmy starts laughing really hard at the Capt. Derry didn't like this so he jumped off of Chain Breaker and punched Jimmy with his elbow real hard on the way down. I didn't even know you could punch with your elbow. I need to talk to Derry about how to fight better. He's so good at it. I loved when he pretended to be a puppet master with that Spaniard when we took the ship. It sure scared the other Spaniards a lot. I don't think I'll ever scare anyone, but if there's any way I can learn, I'm sure Derry can teach me.

What was I saying? Oh yeah, so Derry jumps down at least 20 feet from our deck to the longboat below us and punches Jimmy with his elbow. Then he just stands up. I mean, Derry stands up, but Jimmy doesn't move every again. Then Derry asks if anyone else has anything they want to say or if they have any more jokes or want to laugh at the Capt. One brave…no, one stupid man hits Derry with an oar, but it broke on his chest. Derry looked at him for a second and then just hit him real hard. He hit him so hard he knocked him clean off the boat. I didn't see him move later either.

The other two men were smart and they jumped off the boat and started swimming. That was when Wolverston said that this was bad on account of them being Guthrie's men. None of us know who Guthrie is so we asked. Wolverston said that she ran the island and if we wanted to be able to sell anything on the island it would be through her.

Well, the rest of the guys decided that they didn't want word to get back to Guthrie about these four men, so they shot the other two and they didn't move again either. Dun’know had jumped in the water to swim after them, but then there was so much blood, he got afraid of sharks and swam back to the boat. He and Derry got back on Chain Breaker and they tied up the longboat and we sailed in as far as we could. Then we got in our own longboats and rowed in to the docks. Derry also told the men staying on the ship to get rid of Jimmy's body before we got back.

As we got close to the docks there was some men waiting for us and said that we had to talk to Guthrie. Then they made us give up all our weapons. We went with the men to meet with Mr. Mills. We had to meet him first and he is the guy that really helps out Miss Guthrie, especially with the warehouse full of stuff and all the people that sell for Miss Guthrie. Oh yeah, it turns out Guthrie is a woman, but she sure is tough.

Anyway, we end up talking to Mr. Mills and Miss Guthrie and she offers us a deal. We can either:

Leave, but good luck selling or resupplying anywhere because she has holdings in Port Royal and knows people all over I guess.

She sinks our ship.

Our first time selling we have to sell at half the value that Mr. Mills and us agree on. So if we have 1,000 pieces of 8, then we have to sell it to them for only 500. Also, we have to pay another 1,000 pieces of 8 or 500 and return the longboat.

We decided that the third option was the best one.

We all went back to the ship to start bringing most of the supplies for sale across. There were a few for specific orders in Port Royal, so we are going to take those to make the full payment. Derry gave some of the men different orders and had some stay on board the ship and a couple to setup a fuck tent for after all the work was done. He sent Dun’know to get some women for the fuck tent. After looking at everything, Wolverston figured that the value of everything was 1,400 pieces of 8. Mr. Mills said that it was only worth 900. Derry laughed at it and so did the Capt., so I laughed as well. I said that maybe that was the half price number, but Mr. Mills said it wasn't. Wolverston had been negotiating for us, but he was doing a horrible job. We thought that someone that did this for a living would be a lot better at this stuff, but it turns out he isn't. He's real good at eating and drinking though. Oh and patting his head with a handkerchief. Luckily, the Capt. jumped in and started pointing out some of the better items we had for sale and Mr. Mills reconsidered and offered us 1,200. It wasn't as much as it was worth, but we wanted to be done with it, so Derry and the Capt. accepted the amount.

We told Mr. Mills that we had the longboat, so that meant after the sale, we had a 100 piece credit. We decided to use it to get new sails and a new pirate flag. We left the warehouse and headed to the inn. When we arrived, we found that Matthias had already arrived and gotten us a table. We all got some food and drink and started talking about needing more crew members.

I figured I could walk around and since people don’t notice me that often, I could hear what people were saying about us and if anyone was looking for a new ship to crew. I heard a lot of things about us actually. Some were pretty accurate, like the story about the Capt. shooting someone with a cannon, but others had no clue. Some people didn’t really like Jimmy and thought that he got what he deserved, but another guy said that Jimmy owed him 10 pound and was gonna get that money back one way or another. Finally I found a table where people were talking and they weren’t happy on the ship they were on. As I was leaving another couple people came up to the table and joined them and they were all complaining about their ship.

I went back to our table and let Derry and the Capt. know what I had overheard. Derry and I got up and went to get a round of beer for the table, but for some reason, they wanted to charge him a lot of money for the beers, so I told him not to worry about it. I think that Derry was trying to flirt with that really ugly barmaid, but sometimes he can look real scary. Although now that I think about it, he may have thrown up in his mouth a little when flirting with her. I don’t think she liked that. I suggested we just go up to the table and talk to them and offer to buy them a round of beers. Then maybe we will have a different barmaid that isn’t scared or grossed out by Derry.

"I just bet my balls and shook on it"

Time to get a job and crew

I had just told the Captain and Quartermaster about the table full of possible crew members when a powerful ugly serving wench brought me a free beer. I didn’t even ask for it, but she brought it over. That’s the first time anyone has bought be a beer before. I kind of liked it, except for the cheek pinching part. Anyway, me and Derry and Matthias head over to the table of 6 and they were a funny bunch. One was really rude and looked like he wanted a fight. The guy in charge was ok actually and seemed like he is kind of smart. Then there was this younger guy, maybe 5 or 6 years older than me. He really likes knives, but he did dumb things and got backhanded twice while we were there. Then there was this real old woman and then this even more powerful ugly woman. She looked like she could hammer in nails with her face and only look more appealing after the job was done. Finally they had their own “Pedro”. He was big and dumb and even has a dent in the side of his head. He’s not as big as Pedro and might even be dumber, but I’m not sure. He was too busy trying to eat his own boogers…ewwwww!

Derry immediately pisses the group off and I was worried that he was gonna have to kill 6 more people. Then Matthias kind of stepped in to ask some medical questions and I think he was trying to calm everyone down, but it didn’t really distract them from Derry. The Captain and Mac could tell things looked like trouble when they saw the whole table stand up when Derry made them mad. Mac got a funny look on his face and the Captain sent over a bottle of rum. Oh, and I offered up my beer and the ugly woman took it and drank it. The rum definitely helped…I think.

Anyway, Derry lets them know that he made them mad on purpose because he wanted to make sure we were getting the right sort of people. He wanted people that would stand up for each other. He manages to talk them down and then lets them know that we are looking for a few more crew members for the Chain Breaker. They all liked the name because they were ex-slaves as well. At least a few of them were.

After making sure to point out the Captain, the three of us leave the table and Derry and Matthias walked outside. I went with them, but wasn’t sure why we were leaving. Derry said that they were going to get some clothes for him, for the meeting tonight with Guthrie. I figured there was no reason for that, so I went back to the table.

A little while later the smart one from the other crew came up to talk to the Captain. He said that they had put in their time with their current Captain, I think Captain Low. Oh, and that if we had a good prize then they would be very interested in joining our crew. Then Wolverston came up and said that Captain Low has a fearsome reputation. Wolverston seemed kind of scared and then had to go drink even more than normal…which is a lot.

We all sat there drinking and talking for a couple more hours until it was time for our meeting. We all got brought up to meet with Guthrie, but there was only 2 free chairs at the table. Guthrie and Mills were on the other side. So the Captain goes and sits and for some reason Mac sits down next to him. The Captain has to tell him that the Quartermaster needs to use that chair. At least he got up without a fuss. I went and stood behind the Captain and the Quartermaster to help them if they needed anything while the rest of the crew got to sit in chairs along the wall.

For a moment, Wolverston was heading to the wall because there were no seats left for him, but Guthrie had Mills get up and offer his seat to Wolverston. I had been getting the impression that Wolverston wasn’t really that important after all, but if Guthrie has her main helper get up for Wolverston to sit, maybe I have been wrong. I’ll have to look into this more later.

It was really awkward where nobody was eating anything, except for Wolverston. I tried to interrupt him, just in case it was bad for him to eat before Guthrie, but he was too hungry and he ate every bit of meat off of that drumstick chicken bone in one bite. I’ve never seen anything quite like it before. Turns out that it was ok though and Wolverston slurping away on the chicken bone brought Guthrie out of her head. She did seem kind of distracted. That said, everyone else at the table dug in to their food.

Once the eating started, Guthrie explained that her brother had gone missing. He was a religious sort that found God and while she thought he was kind of silly to believe in all that, she still loved her brother. I guess every now and then he would come through Nassau and bring copies of the Bible that most people just used for kindling. Guthrie explained that she received a letter with just some pine needles and that he had been planning on going to the Isle of Pine. That’s why she thinks it is from him. She also thinks that he must be in some kind of trouble to send something so cryptic.

She wants us to go and find him. If we can find him and bring back word, she will pay us real good. She is also going to outfit us with powder and shot as well as rations. She is also going to provide us with some basic lumber and tar for repairs in case the ship her brother was on isn’t seaworthy. We agreed to do the job and then she left. We all finished up eating and then left as well. Oh, except for Mac and Matthias. Mac was saying stuff that would have gotten us in trouble so Matthias took him outside. I think the term Derry used was that Mac needs to “stop stepping on his dick”.

We were on our way back to the ship with a detour to the fuck tent, when I noticed that there were some people following us. I told Derry to be on the lookout. Right after that, two daggers came flying out of the darkness and bounced off of his chest. One even put a little cut in him, but it didn’t stop him. Then 4 guys ran out of the darkness to attack us. I managed to slide between the legs of one of the guys and hit him in his dangly bits just enough to slow him down so Matthias could stab him with his rapier. Anyway, then I noticed that a bunch of other guys had come out of the darkness from a different direction.

I would say it was scary, but with Derry, I knew we were gonna win. We beat them up pretty good. Two ran away and we grabbed their pouches and some rings. Then we ran off just in case the town watch were to show up. We didn’t want to get in trouble even though we weren’t the ones that started the fight.

We got back to the beach and our fuck tent. It turns out that Dun’know had gotten a good deal, but it was for 5 days and those whores turned out to be real expensive. We still owed 280 pounds on them. Since the ship can’t afford it, Derry went around collecting from people that were gonna partake of the fuckin’ in the fuck tent. Turns out that with the Spaniards and some of the guys, along with the pouches and the rings, we had just enough to pay the bill.

The next day Mills showed up to talk about how long it would take to provision us and when we should get going. Derry tried to tell him 5 days, so we could get all the fuckin’ we could for what we paid. But Mills said that Guthrie wouldn’t like that much time before we set sail. I think Derry is gonna go talk to the pimp about reducing our contracted time and rate. I don’t know if that is going to go well, but I guess we are going to find out.